


Black & White

by magnuspr1m3



Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst and Feels, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Soulmate AU, Steve Rogers Feels, Stony - Freeform, Superfamily, This is a long one, Tony Feels, eventually
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-17
Updated: 2017-04-16
Packaged: 2018-10-19 23:28:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,317
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10650288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magnuspr1m3/pseuds/magnuspr1m3
Summary: Did you love him?Yes. There was not a second’s hesitation with the answer.Did he love you?There was the pause, that dangerous moment of silence. He looked down at the cheap flip phone in his hand, honestly unsure of how to answer for several seconds. In a soft voice, he answered eventually with a simple, Sometimes.





	Black & White

**Author's Note:**

> So, I have too many stories going on that I am writing right now, but that is beside the point.
> 
> This is a soulmate AU, where upon meeting your soulmate, you see in color. And, when your soulmate dies, you lose that ability. Also takes place in a sort of distopian society, where you are assigned a job or "functioning" of sorts. This is further explained in the story, which I hope you all will enjoy, and are down for a long one.

His favorite color was blue. Not blue like the sky, but a dark blue like the sea at its deepest. An almost black sort of blue. Granted most people saw it as black, so he felt it useless to describe it to them. No one asked for your favorite color, and those who could and would understand your answer did not for fear of offending someone who could not see them.

            He supposed that he really liked blue because of the meaning he saw behind it in all of the old readings. It was a color of sadness. Of longing. But it was also a color of hope for some, of love. He read many poems and stories dedicated to bright or deep blue eyes that lit up people’s whole lives. He wanted that. He wanted desperately to see soft blues looking at him every morning. He wanted to see blue again.

 

He worked in the Capitol’s grand library. It was an interesting job that not many got. He did not see many people aside from the occasional school field trip travelling through and his coworkers. Which gave him plenty of time to slack off and read. What he did not finish reading during his work period, he took back to his apartment with him. No one cared if he took them, so long as he returned them. And he always did. It was his job to maintain them, so why would he not?

            He used to bring books home to his partner. They would lounge about and read together, murmuring about plotlines and discolored pages or bindings. He used to bring them home to share. Now, he only brought them home to ease the pain of loneliness and give his mind something to imagine in colors he no longer saw.

 

Do you want to discuss what happened to him? His counselor’s voice was always so gentle. He wondered why she did not become a teacher of some sorts. She was a small woman, but the way she held herself led you to believe otherwise. There was a sense of pride in the set of her shoulders. She liked what she did. She enjoyed helping the broken ones like him. You have not talked about him in quite some time.

            There is nothing else to say. He left for work, and never came back. He took the colors with him. He took my whole world with him.

            It must have been hard for you. It always is for people in your situation. It is not like with those without that connection; while their spouse may die, they don’t feel the connection sever so suddenly like you had. She said all of this to him in that soft voice, barely above a whisper. He vaguely wondered what color her eyes were. He imagined they were brown, a soft dark velvet to match her voice. Most say it did help them to talk about it.

            He shook his head. I have nothing else to say. He is gone. Talking won’t bring him back.

            But talking did always bring back the pain.

 

He had known him his whole life. They were born the same day, laid in little cots next to each other. Their mothers were in the same room. Thankfully the women had stayed in contact, and he had been able to spend most of his life with the other. He did not know the dark, depressing world that everyone else did. All he knew was color and love.

            True, it did not start out as love for them. When they were little, they were told that their connection just meant they were friends forever. Once they learned the true meaning of it in school, around the time they had turned thirteen, it did nothing but make things worse between them. They grew to resent what was between them, something that had been forced upon them at birth. They never asked for it. It felt like they had no choice when it came to who they loved or dated. They stopped talking for a while, and his friend almost immediately started chasing after anyone who would give him the time of day.

            That hurt. He did not know why it hurt. He was as against the connection as his friend was, of course. But it still hurt. Was he not good enough? Was that why his friend was upset? Because he got lumped with some book worm who was not quite that attractive and more than a bit clingy? What had he done to make his friend hate him?

            Eventually he doubted himself into a depression, and it nearly destroyed him. When he woke up in the hospital, arms wrapped in thick bandages, he realized just how close a call it had been. His whole body ached, but not as badly as the broken look on his best friend’s face hurt his heart. Why? His friend had croaked out, obviously choking on tears. Why would you do that? A-are you stupid?

            Is that why you left? He knew very well that it was a bit of a low blow, but he had to know. Why had his friend just thrown him aside? They still could have been friends!

            I left because I didn’t want you stuck to me. But then y-you had to go and _die_ and take all of the color with you. It was brief, just a flicker of it, but if that’s what life is really like without you… I _can’t_.

            So they did not ever again. Until his other half died on the way to work. Permanently.

 

It had been six years from the death of his love when they knocked on the door of his apartment. He had the day off, a rare thing that he intended to take advantage of to work on some of his art. The knock had come while he was in the middle of working on a charcoal portrait of… _him_. Charcoals were easier for him to work with. No colors to get mixed up or confused about. And they were just the right amount of messy, coating his hands and fingers in dark black stains. He begrudgingly wiped his hands clean, calling out for a minute as he hid the drawings amongst a pile of old books.

            He was surprised by the woman who entered, dressed in a nice suit and looking about his apartment. Excuse me? He asked, frowning deeply at the intrusion. Who did this dame think she was? Can I help you?

            Yes, you can. You’re Steven Rogers, mate of the deceased James Barnes? The smooth, accented tone sounded wrong saying _his_ name. It was all so wrong. No one said his name anymore. No one. All he could do was muster up a jerky nod, struggling to say something. Then I would appreciate it if you could come with me. You’ve been selected for an experimental trial by Stark Industries. Feel free to decline, but I’ve been told that it will be worth your while.

            Somewhere, deep in the recesses of his mind, he heard his love laugh, urging him on. _Oh, this’ll be great. Go see what they want, punk. Then tell ‘em to go stuff it._

            Well, he certainly did one of those things.

 

A good few hours had gone by where he had simply sat at a table, flipping through pamphlet after pamphlet about the program he had been selected for. An experiment run by the Capitol’s head scientist, a suave man if he had ever met one. He reminded him of _him_ in some ways; the way he held himself, the confidence with which he moved through a room. His eyes, though. He could already tell they were a darker shade, likely brown. Even in his world of dull greys, whites, and blacks, he could tell that much.

            Why me? He had asked. It was a simple question that likely held a complex answer. Or, well, he had thought it did anyway.

            Because your other half is dead, and you aren’t. The man was blunt, practically floating about the room as he rushed around it, messing with this machine or that machine. Did you know 80 percent of those who lose their other half die within six months? You have lived for _six years_. You have far exceeded the life span of anyone else in your situation ever. I want to know why.

            He snorted. You mean the Capitol wants to know why?

            No. I mean, I want to know why, and the Capitol wants to take whatever gene you have and harness it for that convoluted project of theirs you read about.

            At least he was honest.

 

Two years later, he would remember that conversation as he clutched onto the flight controls of his plane, doing his best to keep it in the air as he flew above the Arctic Circle. He had set his pocket watch on the arm of his chair, opened and proudly displaying the only picture he had left of his love. _Soon_ , he thought. He set his jaw, eyes focusing forward once more to the steadily approaching ice. Over the radio, he heard her, the brunette who stole him from their apartment that day. He heard her demanding that he get that plane in the air again, that he wait for her to get Howard. He would know what to do, she said. Her tone said otherwise, though. She was frightened, and just as sure of his impending death as he was.

            She just wanted the man to be able to say good bye.

            I can’t. His voice was choked and broken, and his cheeks were wet. I can’t. This is it. It was finally his time, and while he had enjoyed his life with the other man immensely, he just wanted to go _home_. That was all he had wanted for almost a decade now. You tell him that I-

            His transmission never finished. The ice came forward too quickly, or perhaps he went down too fast, and the water filled the cockpit before he knew what happened. It was cold. Too cold. The chill gripped him in its firm grasp and would not let go. He gave into it. He grabbed his shield and his watch, placing the latter in his pocket before simply reclining the seat and resting the shield over his chest. They would find his body eventually. They would know he found peace.

            As the pressure on his lungs grew and the drowsiness from the cold forced his eyes shut, he thought that maybe, just maybe, he saw blue. Sweet, sweet blue.

.   .   .

He had always seen little bits of colors. It started when he was little. When the family hired a new butler, he had originally been hesitant. The old one had been mean, but this new one had a ‘funny voice’ and snuck him all sorts of sweets. He loved him, so the colors started to appear. It was never a romantic love; more familial, like a father. But he loved him so strongly that it did not matter. The colors came, and they did not leave. Not until the butler passed away peacefully in his sleep when he was seventeen years old.

            His mom had said it was because he was so sweet. Of course the thirteen year-old blew the explanation off. Something was wrong with him, obviously. There was no other explanation as to why he saw all those colors growing up. His father simply called him a freak if he brought it up, so he stopped doing that. Hell. He stopped talking to the man entirely.

Then they both died, when he was three years from finishing. So he spent his last couple semesters of college trying to research his condition, trying to force the image of his mother’s mangled body from his mind by putting all of his brain power into something useful. It haunted him every time his eyes shut for even a moment. All of that red… he never wanted to see the color again. He was determined to figure out just how to do so. He eventually bonded with another aspiring scientist, an anxious brunette studying gene enhancement. He had jokingly asked how that had anything to do with the other’s major, physics.

            What does it have to do with mechanical engineering? had come as the reply, and he could do nothing other than smirk.

            We are going to be friends for a long time.

            He never told him that as they grew closer, the colors started to come back again. No one needed to know that.

 

He had somehow been roomed with a freshman during his third graduate year; they were the same age, so housing had thought it would be alright. He wanted to yell at them that, no, it was absolutely not alright. He had wanted to live with his friend. They should have lived together. He actually _liked_ that friend, and he had a feeling that this kid was going to hate him. The ROTC type. Great.

            He might be cool, his friend had tried to persuade him as he moped in his dorm room.  Might be was the keyword, though. He was not buying it. The kid looked stiff, and had gone to bed at 11 the first night to wake up at 4 the next morning. He had not even gone to sleep yet when the kid woke up!

            His friend turned out to be right, in the end. Although, he would not learn this until a party gone terribly wrong. A party where he had way more to drink than he could handle at that age, and had been much more ballsy than he had the muscle mass to back up.

            After that party, they were inseparable, and his world became even more colorful.


End file.
